


choke down the bronze, i'll see you again

by Anonymous



Category: The Gentleman's Guide to Vice and Virtue Series - Mackenzi Lee
Genre: GUESS WHAT HE'S NOT ACTUALLY DEAD, M/M, authored by the resident shitty anonymous writer, background simhanna but they're not together yet, barely mentioned but he's trans, because it's awful, good thing no one is reading this i'm a shitty person and a shittier writer, i'm an asshole aren't i, i'm cackling evilly, no editing we die like men, this was written in less than twenty-four hours, trans percy, which is why it's anonymous
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-11-28
Updated: 2020-11-28
Packaged: 2021-03-09 20:00:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,877
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/27761884
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/
Summary: wrote this in less than twenty-four hours. it's awful. this is the first tggtvav fic i've posted but we'll pretend it isn't.
Relationships: Henry "Monty" Montague/Percy Newton
Comments: 2
Kudos: 4
Collections: Anonymous





	1. Chapter 1

The first time the two of us met, it was because he put a knife to my throat.

I'd been in an enormous, smoky, crowded bar, full of drunk people-- not my favorite place to spend an evening. To this day, I can't fathom how anyone genuinely _enjoys_ such places. The most famous mysteries of the world are nothing on the oddities of the commercial bar. Especially places like this, which are furnished in a way that makes it obvious they're run by rich men but which are constantly understaffed and dirty.

But I wasn't here on my own time, so I didn't have the choice of whether to be in an awful bar downtown. I'd arrived with my band (we play all sorts of music, and I go from a standard violin to a fancy electric model to occasionally filling in as a guitarist, but I'm never the star of the show). A gig, that's all it was; a way for the six of us to make some money. The show had gone well, at least in my estimation; I hadn't played any noticeable wrong notes, and plenty of people had cheered at the end of every song.

Since we'd finished our set, though, we'd all been sticking around for a few hours. The manager said we could stay even if we don't buy anything as long as we didn't tell the owner that, and our singer, Johanna, who's a sheltered rich kid, barely twenty-one, and has since her birthday been glorying in the forbidden atmosphere of alcohol-laden spaces, decided it was imperative that we remain, if only out of politeness to this very kind man who decided our band was good enough for his bar.

From across the room I could hear her laugh, spinning around on a barstool with our bassist standing by to make sure she doesn't fall. If I had to guess, I would've thought she'd had a drink or two, but I wasn't worried about her. Our bassist, Sim, is tough, doesn't drink, and seems to have a soft spot for our pretty lead singer. Our drummer is there too; she's also hardly drinking age but is much more interested in talking animatedly to Sim, most likely about whatever groundbreaking medical research she's read about recently. This is the job she works when she's not in pre-med; everyone knows that as soon as she gets into medical school, she'll disappear on us, off to greener pastures, and all of us will be proud to see her go, even though we'll definitely miss her.

So I thought there was no danger in leaving them. The other two of our members weren't visible in the crowd, but they're both older than me, so it's not my job to police them. Scipio and Ebrahim can take care of themselves-- and more often than not, they're the ones who need to take care of _me_.

I was wrong, of course, in my assumption that stepping out of the bar into the slightly-cooler alleyway for some air wouldn't be dangerous, although doing it was much more dangerous to me than to my bandmates.

He was already in the alleyway when I entered and slammed the door behind me, crouched on the paving stones and rummaging through a black backpack. As soon as he heard me, he was on his feet, stumbling towards me with the unmistakable gait of someone who's very drunk-- and then he pulled a knife out of his pocket and slammed me against the wall.

I tried to cry out, but he clamped a hand over my mouth and waited until I shut up. His knife went to my throat. I had absolutely no choice but to comply with him now, since I didn't have a weapon on me.

So instead I froze, staring into the eyes of the man who was trying to kill me.

He looked about my age, with wavy hair (in the light I couldn't tell exactly what color it was), a lot shorter than me and quite stocky. He smelled like gin, further confirming my suspicions that he was absolutely wasted. He must have been quite strong, though, to pin me against this wall like that-- and I suddenly realized it was a bit of a compromising position in more ways than the fact that he's got a knife at my throat.

"What are you _doing_?" I hissed at him. "I didn't try to hurt you or steal whatever you've got in that backpack, now let me _go_."

He faltered for a moment, looking sincerely confused. "You're not?"

"Why would I be?"

His words came out a bit slurred. "Because I stole this from the man who owns the bar, and you just came out of the bar in a leather jacket."

"What does the leather jacket have to do with anything?"

"It's threatening-- even though it suits you quite well."

I shook my head helplessly. "Well, I'm in a band. Which played at the bar. And I'm not turning you in for thievery. Happy?"

"Yes," he said, smiling a little bit but not moving the knife. "You promise, darling?"

I can't lie-- even weeks later with the memories dulled by loss, my heart still flutters when I remember him calling me _darling_. Perhaps it's only because he was handsome, perhaps it's because he was mysterious, but regardless, the flutter was there. "I promise. Now, will you please get that knife off my throat?"

"Anything for you," he said, then turned on his heel, shoving the knife into his pocket as he released me. Before I could get another word in, he'd picked up the backpack and run somewhat unsteadily in the other direction.

The next time I saw him, I was onstage.

It'd been another bar, on the other half of the city, and far more friendly. It didn't smell like smoke inside, although there was a lot of dust in the corners. The crowd was thinner, and they seemed to like us a lot, judging by how much they cheered and the not-incidental number of people who tipped us after the show.

During the show, though, I'd kept my composure until halfway through the fourth piece, at which point I'd made the mistake of looking out across the crowd. They were mostly mingling, getting drinks, chattering, but there was one person in the back who was watching us with a bizarrely intent expression.

I was curious-- who wouldn't be? If he were really that interested, he'd have come closer to us. Most likely, he couldn't even hear us from so far away. I kept one eye on my fingers, making sure to play the right notes regardless of my thoughts, and turned every shred of spare attention in the direction of the gawker in the back.

He winked at me.

I nearly dropped my bow, which would have been awful and humiliating. A mistake like that would've thrown off the rest of the band and quite likely would've gotten us a few jeers, if we weren't outright booed off the little platform this establishment defined as a stage. Luckily, I managed to keep hold of myself for the few seconds it took me to turn all my attention back to playing. For the rest of the set, though, my fingers were shaking violently.

Why, you might ask? If I wasn't mistaken (and even though it'd been dark the first time we met, I was quite sure that I wasn't mistaken) the stranger in the back was the same thievery-prone drunk who'd threatened me.

After we finally made it through our pieces, I mumbled an excuse to Scipio and hurried off. Felicity cast me a stray glance from where she was packing up her drum set, but didn't follow me. In my endeavor to reach the mystery knife-wielding thief, I bumped into about four different people and caused at least one person to spill their drink. And yet, in the end, it was all worth it, because I caught his arm just as he was leaving.

He started like he was going to jump out of his skin when I touched him, but once he turned and saw me, he smoothly changed his expression to a rakish smile."Well, hello there, darling."

"What are you doing here?"

It came out a bit harsher than I meant it to, but he took me in stride. "Can't a man go to a bar for a drink and to see a beautiful violinist play?"

"How'd you find me? Why'd you find me?"

"I found the name of your band on the sign outside the bar the next day. Your singer posts about every bar you play on your official social media accounts. Plus, I know someone in your band. It wasn't hard at all."

I sighed heavily, pinching the bridge of my nose. "So I'm sure you know a lot about me already."

"Sure do, Percy Newton, violinist, gay icon."

"You think _I'm_ a gay icon? I wouldn't define myself as an icon of any type, gay, trans, or otherwise."

"Fair enough. I wouldn't think you're an icon either-- your band hasn't made it big yet. But someday I think you will be."

"You think so? Who are you that thinks so?"

He shrugged. "An admirer. Now will you please let go of me so I can get on with my life?"

I let him go, reluctantly. "Aren't you going to tell me your name?"

"Why would I do that, darling?" For a moment, I thought it's just another piece of banter. He couldn't have be serious about it-- I deserve to know the name of the man who threatened me and is now flirting with me and is throwing me far, far out of my depths. He stepped closer, and I was expecting him to say his name quietly in his ear-- but instead, he cupped my face, pulled me in, and kissed me on the mouth.

It was a nice kiss, a lovely kiss. I've never been the lyricist of this group, preferring to remain on the melodies and harmonies, but if I were, I would’ve written a thousand songs about this one kiss. A line Sim wrote once flashed through my mind-- _can a kiss mean both emotion and addiction, or sweetheart, is that too much of a contradiction?_

When he pulled away from me, I meant to ask what he meant by it, if he really liked me or just did it to shut me up. I didn't get a chance, though. Before I could say anything, he turned on his heel and disappeared before I could get a second glance.

A few days later, I managed to seize a moment at practice when no one is talking or playing. Several of us were still setting up our instruments, but wasn't any off-topic personal chatter going on, which is quite rare. Scipio often takes advantage of these moments to bring up scheduling or something similar, but he was still struggling with a broken guitar string in the corner, so I have a chance.

"Uh, this is sort of a weird question, but--" And with that, immediately everyone began staring at me as I awkwardly trail off into silence.

"Yes, Percy?" Sim asked, smoothing out her jeans. "Go on with your 'weird question'."

"Does anyone-- does anyone know a man about my age, about this high--" here I gestured at my chest level-- "with wavy blond hair? A bit of a human disaster? Calls people 'darling?'"

Everyone gave me blank stares and murmurs in the negative-- except for Felicity, who let out a long, heavy sigh.

I turned to her. "Do you know him?"

"I do, in fact, know a short man with wavy blond hair who calls people 'darling' and who is extraordinarily obnoxious. He's my brother, his name is Monty. Why do you care, anyway? Did you meet him?"

"You could say that." I could feel a blush rising to my cheeks. _Get a hold on yourself. It was just a kiss._

"Well, I don't know why you want to know anything about him, but that's Monty. I haven't seen him in a few months."

"Why not?"

She shrugged. "I don't live at home anymore, I'm busy with school, he's busy with my father's business, and we're not close."

"He's a businessman?" The thief-- _Monty_ \-- didn't seem like the type to go into desk work, particularly since he'd been stealing from the owner of an expensive bar and had some tendency to threaten strangers with knives.

"He works in business. Like our father."

An awkward silence settled over us, which Johanna broke by piping up in the cheeriest voice that is humanly possible. "So! Since Percy has gotten his answer, we should move on to practicing, then?"

Now that I knew his name, I'd been hoping I could figure out a way to see him again. The internet turned up plenty of information on his father, a slightly-less-than-reputable businessman by the name of Henry Montague. Everyone else in his world seemed to think he hung the moon with the apartment buildings he ordered to be constructed, but I read many an angry letter to the editor blaming him for gentrification and pollution. Monty, however, didn't seem to have an online footprint at all. If I were going to meet him, it'd have to be on his initiative.

For weeks I scanned crowds before concerts, looking for Monty's charming face winking at me, but failed every time. A few of the other band members started teasing me about it, asking if I had a boyfriend who I expected to show up for us. I managed to get away with avoiding their questions every time.

He wasn't there. Monty simply wasn't there. He hadn't come back for me.

I felt slighted by it, like his absence was a personal insult. If he didn't care about me, and didn't want to see me again, why would he have kissed me before he left? Dd he do this all the time? Were there ten or twenty people all hoping he'd come back to see them again? When he called me _darling_ , did it actually mean he cared at all?

I puzzled these questions for days on end, torturing myself with longing. Finally, I decided that he wasn't coming back. It all meant nothing. Monty was gone. He might as well have been dead.

And of course, I saw him the next day, in the last place I expected him. Fortune is a cruel mistress sometimes.

I'd been alone (well, not alone, as no one can ever be alone in the city, but without my bandmates or anyone I actually knew) in the grocery store, buying myself produce to take home to the shoebox apartment I had the privilege to call home. I'd been leaning down to pick up an onion from a low shelf when someone ran headlong into me, knocking me, my onion, and my basket to the ground. The stranger fell on top of me, swearing under their breath-- and as soon as I looked up, I found myself staring into his face.

"Monty?" He's got very blue eyes; I hadn't noticed before, in the dim light of the bars, but out here in the light they glowed with an intensity like a hot flame.

"What?" He blinked at me. "I think you've got the wrong person."

"No, your name is Monty. You stole from the owner of that bar, threatened me with a knife, kissed me in a different bar, and then _disappeared_ on me."

"How'd you find out my name?"

"Asked your sister." I pushed him off me and started picking up the spilled groceries and putting them back in my basket. He tried to help, but I swatted his hand away. "Nope. I want some answers, _sweetheart_. Why'd you disappear?" My voice comes out hard-edged and bitter.

He looked utterly stunned. "I didn't disappear?"

"Yes, you _did_. I tought you were going to come back for me. I couldn't find anything about you online, but you know what bars we're playing at, so I thought you would come to see me again. Monty, what is wrong with you? You can't just kiss someone and disappear on them."

He didn't look at me. "I can do whatever I want."

I tossed my onion into the basket. "You _can't_. You can't just hurt people and never face the consequences. Monty, I deserve some answers."

"Fine." He sighed. "You're handsome. I liked you. I'm sorry I put a knife to your throat. I didn't come back because I've been scared to leave my house."

I softened immediately. "Why? What happened?"

The shoppers around us seemed annoyed that we're sitting on the floor in the middle of the aisle; someone gave us a dirty look as they maneuvered their cart around the mess my purchases have made. Monty picked up a bag of celery and placed it in the basket; this time, I didn't stop him.

"It doesn't matter much. Remember the man I stole from? Well, I actually apparently stole a priceless box which contained the instructions for some miracle cure for cancer, which the owner of the bar-- he's actually a duke-- took from a doctor's lab. I didn't know this at the time, but now I have this box. Or I did, until my father found out, took it from me, and gave it back to the duke. And now he's threatened that if I leave the house, he'll disinherit me."

I placed my hand gently on his shoulder. "So why are you out here now?"

"I needed a drink. Grocery store whiskey is cheaper than going to a bar."

"And then what are you going to do? Go home?"

He closed off his expression quickly, but for a moment, I thought I might have caught a glimpse of fear in his eyes. "I don't-- I have to. So that I'm not disinherited."

"Do you want to?"

He shook his head, almost imperceptibly. "I don't have any other choice. All I can do is put my hands down, sneak around, and try to keep him from disinheriting me."

I quickly gathered up the rest of my purchases. "What if you come with me?"

He froze, then stared at me like he thought I was about to reveal the punchline to a joke. Undeterred, I continued. "Just don't go home. If he disinherits you, he disinherits you. Your sister is doing fine on her own. You could be doing that too. Share my flat, get a job, do something you enjoy."

For a moment, it seemed like he might be considering it. His mouth opened, then closed again, then opened. I watched him, waiting for his decision. I'd been hoping desperately that he'd say yes-- whatever was going on, it had to be bad for him, and if his father scared Monty that thoroughly, his father's business empire wasn't something I wanted him to be left with for the rest of his life. To this day, I'm not able to articulate why I cared so much about him and his well-being in that grocery store aisle. Maybe no one will ever know.

I'm sure we'll never know what went through his head in the moments before he answered. I've replayed the memories in my head a thousand times, trying to pinpoint the changes in his expression. After all this time, I've never been able to figure anything new out. All I know is that a little smile came to his face for a moment, then disappeared like a candle flame being snuffed out.

"No. I can't."

He scrambled to his feet, pulled me up as well, and shoved the basket into my hands before I could even react. "I can't. Sorry, darling."

I grabbed his wrist before he could leave me. "Wait. Sweetheart. Monty. Promise I'll see you again?"

His face was unreadable. "I'll try."

By then, I was grasping at straws. I didn't want him to go, to disappear, to fade out of my life before I'd even had a chance to get used to him. "Can I at least have a kiss before you go?"

He gave me a wobbly smile-- and lord, I think it must have been the most genuine smile he's ever given me. "Anything for you, Percy."

Of all the places to have a last kiss, a grocery store aisle is not the worst place. I dropped the basket in favor of wrapping my arms around him, and even after he pulled away, I kept him close, hugging him tight. He smelled like wine and sugar, wild and lonely and silent. The smell clung to me for hours after he disentangled himself, whispered "Goodbye, darling," and disappeared into the crowd of people.

After that I was certain I would see him again. Full of hope and giddy joy and the slightest bit of worry, I looked for him everywhere I went. In grocery stores and concert halls and art museums, on packed subway cars and empty train stations, I kept my eyes out for him.

But he never came back.

Felicity missed three band practices in a row, texting us to say she wouldn't make it but offering no explanation for her absence. When she returned to us, she was pale and thin in a black dress-- not the sort of black one wore every day, but a velvet thing that swallowed her whole.

When she stepped inside, everyone went silent, which was just as well. Something had happened to her voice; she was barely audible when she spoke, apologizing for her absence.

"Don't worry, Feli, you're fine," I said on impulse. "What happened? You don't have to tell us but--"

I cut myself off. She was staring at me, hollow-eyed, as she said the words that beat to death my wild, hungry hope.

"My brother is dead."


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> well. this is awfully written and i'm a terrible writer but this is low-key addictive. just writing shit out and throwing it at the world is neat (even though no one's reading it).

So there was the story of Monty and me. He was here, he kissed me twice, and then he was dead.

It'd make a pretty awful romance novel, if you ask me.

I refused to believe it.

Felicity told me he died by falling off a bridge--she has no idea what bridge exactly, it could be any of the dozens in the city. Or perhaps he didn't fall-- maybe he jumped. We don't know. Her father is the only one who knew anything about his death. There was no funeral; there wasn't body I could look at and see, no way to know for a fact that he's dead. Only his father's word.

Felicity put absolute trust in her father's word. "Why would he lie about something like that?" she asked me desperately as we're walking together. After the band practice when she'd broken the news, I'd decided to walk her home, even though the sky was overcast and rain was probably on the way. I couldn't have gone back to my empty apartment without learning something more than _he's dead_. "He wouldn't have, couldn't have. Monty is-- was-- his son. His firstborn. His heir. People don't lie about their children dying."

I said nothing. Good people don't lie about their children dying. People in stable situations with support systems and good parents don't fake their own deaths. Monty had neither of those things.

She whirled on me. "You don't really think he's still alive, do you?"

"It's unlikely," I conceded. As if to punctuate my statement, the sky let out a crack of thunder.

"It's impossible. Percy, you're just lying to yourself. He's not alive. He's gone, and the sooner you get that through your head, the sooner you'll be able to recover from it."

Lightning flashed, the sky seeming to crack straight down the middle. I nodded silently, but I longed to shout at her, even though she doesn't deserve my anger. Still, I wanted to throw my suspicions and worries in her face, scream to the rooftops that _he faked his death, it's all a lie, Monty Montague is still alive_. But his sister was grieving him, his sister who must know him a thousand times better than I ever could, so I didn't say it.

Instead, I walked in silence until we made it to Felicity's apartment (which she shares with several classmates) told Felicity goodbye, and headed home.

By the time I'd dropped Felicity off, it had begun to rain, and by the time I made it inside I was soaking wet. For once, though, I didn't mind it, as I had other priorities.

After a quick search, I found Monty's obituary in the local newspaper, which described him as a young man in the prime of his life who died tragically before his time. It included several quotes from his father, all of which were obfuscatory and vague. The obituary told me absolutely nothing about Monty; it didn't describe the exact circumstances of his death, simply calling it tragic. It also didn't tell me anything about what Monty was actually _like_ ; nothing about his friends or his family or his interests or his personality. This was not the sort of elegy the Monty I knew deserved. It could have been an obituary for any twenty-five year old man on earth.

Undeterred, I kept digging. The further I fell down the rabbit hole, the stranger it got. Apparently there had been no witnesses to the death besides Henri Montague, there had been no criminal investigation, and it had immediately been ruled a suicide. No body was found, nor any evidence that Monty was ever on the bridge off of which he allegedly fell.

 _It could have been suicide--_ but I immediately shook that thought out of my head. It wasn't. It also wasn't murder-- Henri Montague wouldn't have killed his own son. Monty is still out there. I had to believe that.

Which means, if I started by assuring myself that Monty isn't dead, I then knew that Monty faked his death and his father is going along with it, or that Henri Montague wanted everyone to believe that Monty is dead and _Monty_ , for some reason, went along with it.

The convenience of trying to research a person who is quite prominent in society is that it's not difficult at all to find the address of his residence. Henri Montague lives in a well-to-do neighborhood only twenty minutes from my apartment if I walk, or less if I take the subway. It would be quite easy to go there and request an audience with him.

So that's exactly what I did.

I knocked on the door of the brownstone in which Monty's father lives (and apparently also Monty until his faked death, Monty's seven-year-old brother, and his mother). I was received by an honest-to-god _butler_ , who introduced himself as Sinclair and told me to sit down inside while he fetched Mr. Montague. I didn't really have any choice but to sit in the extravagant front room, twiddling my thumbs until he arrived.

A few minutes after Sinclair left, a door opened on the right side of the room, and I straightened to attention, expecting Monty's mother-- but instead it was a woman in an elegant dress, who didn't seem to expect me at all. When she saw me, she nearly jumped out of her skin.

I stood up and crossed the room to her. "I'm Percy Newton. Good afternoon, ma'am."

"Good afternoon," she said shakily. "I'm Violet Montague-- Mr. Montague's wife. Why exactly are you here?"

"I'm here to visit-- Henry," I told her on a whim. I'd learned Monty's given name from the obituary. It was close enough to his father's that if necessary, I could claim I'd meant Mr. Montague rather than Monty; I waited for her to react and hoped desperately that she'd let something slip.

Her face turned bone-white. "You won't be able to visit him."

"I'm a very close friend of his," I assured her, lying through my teeth.

"Well-- are you? I thought all of the city believed him dead."

And there we are. If it were true that Monty is gone forever, she would have phrased it differently. She might have said "knew he was dead" or "heard the bad news" or "was aware of his passing". The way she said it implied that he truly wasn't dead and that she believed I knew the truth.

So I went with it. "Not all of the city. Why is it that I can't visit him?"

"He's either dead or in France."

Well, that threw me for a loop. "Can you tell me where in France, exactly?"

She shook her head. "I don't know. No one knows. That's all he wrote about his location in his note-- _don't bother trying to catch up, I'm off to France."_

"He wrote a note? To you?"

"Yes. To me, and another one to my husband. I assume you know he disappeared without our previous knowledge. His note told me nearly nothing except that he is not dead, he is in France, and he can't tell me why he's faked his death."

I blinked for a moment. "What about his note to your husband?"

"Henri tells me it said that he was planning to jump off a bridge."

My brain wasn't running fast enough to keep up with all this. "So Mr. Montague got a note, and he tells you that it was Henry's suicide note, and now he's told everyone that Henry is in fact dead. But you received a note stating that Henry's now in France. Does your husband know you got this note?"

"He doesn't," she said, then suddenly faltered. "I shouldn't be telling you all this."

"Why not? I'm one of his closest friends. I think I have a right to know."

"You _don't_. No one should know. He said-- oh, damn it all." I wasn't expecting her to curse; she didn't seem at all the type for it, so I was too stunned to ask her what exactly she was cursing about before she continued. "He said not to tell anyone he's alive. Not even his sister, not even his father. Not a single soul in this city knows that Henry may possibly still remain alive except for me. And now you."

She began frenetically pacing the room. "You cannot tell a soul, you hear me?"

I nodded instantly. "I won't tell. Can I just ask one more question?"

She let out a long sigh. "If you don't tell, yes, one more question."

"Why does your husband believe that your son is dead?"

She looks at me, shocked. "Because of the note! Of course!"

"But there was no body found?"

"Who could find a body in a river like that?"

"The obituary said your husband witnessed M-- Henry's death. Is that true?"

"How should I know, Percy Newton?" There was a bit of genuine anger in her voice. "My husband says so, and his word is law. If he asserts something true, no policeman will ever believe the contrary. As far as anyone is concerned, what is printed in the obituary is the truth. Do you understand?"

"Ah-- yes. Thank you. I won't tell anyone."

She gave me a cold stare. "Now, since you cannot visit my son at this location, it would be lovely if you would vacate the premises."

At that, I left. Sinclair must have returned to find me gone, but I'll never truly know. Talking to Monty's father wouldn't be productive at this stage, now that I know he's alive.

Per his request, I didn't tell Felicity that Monty is alive and well somewhere in France. Since I couldn't imagine seeing her and having to keep that secret from her face, I simply avoided her for a few days. I had other things on my plate anyway; somehow, I had to get myself a plane ticket to France. Even after searching my apartment and my bank account, I knew I didn't have enough money to go to France for a few days if I wanted to continue paying my rent back here.

And then the idea hit me. Looking back, I don't think I'd been acting rationally; what kind of person pulls up their roots to live in France for a month with absolutely no warning? I may have been running on utter impulse, but in the moment it seemed like the only reasonable thing to do.

So I waited a few weeks and saved up as much money as I could possibly get from the band and my day job (an awful position at a grocery store, but it at least paid). I worked hard and played harder, avoiding being alone with Felicity like a housecat avoiding water. Scipio was actually impressed by the speed at which I'd been able to learn our newest song.

I'm pretty sure Felicity thought I was only acting this way out of grief. She was busy grieving Monty as well as practicing, performing, and studying, but she somehow still managed to pay a little attention to me-- enough to notice I was acting differently but not enough to realize what my goal was. Sim and Johanna didn't even seem to notice any difference in my behavior; it wasn't my business, and I didn't have time to ferret around or figure it out from contextual clues, but Johanna was apparently having some sort of crisis which Sim felt it imperative to help her with. Ebrahim and Scipio checked in on me occasionally, but they didn't seem to be all that worried about me. They all placed trust in me, which is both reassuring and uncomfortable, since I wasn't telling them most of what I was focused on day to day.

I told them I was going to France for a few months the morning after I told my landlord. Everyone was shocked out of their minds, and immediately demanded to know why, exactly, I'd decided to do such a thing. I mumbled something about an orchestral opportunity, classes with a master whose name I didn't specify.

"How are we supposed to run the band without you?" Johanna demanded.

"You'll manage fine. It's not like I'm your singer."

"You're still important. We'll have to change every song without you, to work around the absence of the violin."

"And you'll be able to do it. I'm going regardless. I'll be back eventually, but this is an important opportunity for me and I'll regret it if I don't go."

"Percy, I wasn't going to tell you not to go. I was just hoping for a bit of _warning_."

"This is a warning. I'm going at the end of the month."

Sim laughed. "Johanna. He's right, you know. We'll all miss him, but it's a lot like how we all know Feli will stop playing with us someday. He can move up in the world without it being an insult to us."

Johanna pouted at her. I swear, I could feel Sim recoil into herself. Johanna's pout is nothing I'd ever want directed at me. "Except she'll be going to medical school, that's not the _same_. And that's a long way off."

Felicity looked outraged-- which is a rare thing these days. "It's not _so_ different! And it's only going to be around a year until I go!"

"Plus, I'm coming back," I added. "You don't need to act so betrayed."

"Very well," Johanna sighed. "At least bring us back some good stories."

"And maybe some sort of good French pastry," Ebrahim added, smiling a little bit.

"Make sure you stay safe, Percy." That's Scipio for you, ever the mother-hen.

I smiled at him. "I will. Promise."

I've never had many belongings, but everyone insisted on coming over to help me pack up anyway, and it was a very fun time for the first hour or so. We weren't the most efficient, since we stopped every few minutes to trade stories or joke or laugh. Someone would start putting something in a box, and then get distracted by Sim doing a handstand or Ebrahim talking about a bar he'd played in once, set it down any old place, and then, by the time they got back to the matter at hand, forget where they put it.

I had a great time until Felicity cornered me in my bedroom. I didn't realize what she was doing for a few moments. By the time she'd closed the door and sat down on the bed next to me, I couldn't reasonably make an excuse to leave.

"Percy. You do realize you're not convincing me in the slightest that you're just picking your life up on a whim to go to France for a few months to learn from some master violinist, yes?"

"What's unconvincing about that? It's the truth."

" _Percy_."

I sighed heavily. "Feli. Please don't."

"Don't what? Don't ask why you're lying to your closest friends? Don't ask why you're actually going to France-- are you even actually going to France? Pray tell, Percy Newton, what is it that I'm not allowed to know?"

"Fine. I _am_ going to France, I promised not to tell anyone what I'm doing there, and I lied because if I just told everyone 'I'm going to France but you're not allowed to know why', none of you would let me get away with that. And I convinced everyone but you, so I think it's going pretty well, actually."

"Is that all you're going to tell me? That's all I get for being clever enough to see throug you?"

"I really am sorry."

"Don't be. Do better." And with that, she got up from the bed and left me still sitting there, slamming the door behind her, leaving me alone with my thoughts.

I had to go to France. There was no chance in hell I would stay here this far away from Monty when I wasn't sure if he was safe and everyone else in the world (besides his mother, who wasn't going anywhere) thought he was dead. Sure, it was wrong to lie to Felicity-- and everyone, but especially Felicity-- but how wrong could it be, if I was only respecting Monty's wishes? Besides, I couldn't call off the trip now. I'd already informed my landlord I was leaving, bought a plane ticket, and at the moment was boxing up my worldly possessions to move for a month.

So I had no choice in the matter, really.

After I returned to my friends, we actually packed up my things-- everything except for the clothes, bedding, and dishes I'd need for the next few days until I left. Johanna took a few boxes of stuff-- things like my books and my winter clothes that I wouldn't miss for a month and didn't really need to take on a plane with me to another country. She had the most space in her apartment, so she graciously volunteered to take care of them for me ( or rather, Scipio pointed out that someone would have to, and then everyone stared at Johanna until she agreed to it).

On the morning I was intended to leave, Johanna called me; I'd been packing up my bedding when she did so, so I missed her call and she left a voicemail. Curious, I listened to it.

"Hi, Percy. Good luck on your trip. Be safe. Call one of us if anything happens, okay? I know we'll be too far away to help you, really, but we can always try. Offer some emotional support and all that. Felicity seems a bit worried about you, so I thought I'd call."

I could hear her enormous dog barking in the background. She whispered a few irritated words under her breath, then shouted "Max, _down_ , don't knock over the vase! Sim, can you-- Sorry, Percy, I need to--"

And it was then, in the middle of the sentence, that the voicemail cut off, as if she'd fumbled over the ending button without time to say a proper goodbye. I wondered what exactly Max had been doing. Sim must have been there, for some reason or another, although it's not uncommon for the girls to stay over at Johanna's apartment. Sim's also always making excuses to visit Johanna. If I were more inclined to tease Sim, I would have joked that she all but lives there now. Unfortunately, Sim doesn't always respond well to gentle mockery.

When I called her back, I got her voicemail as well-- probably because she was still chasing after her unruly, slobbery dog.

_"Hey, Johanna. I promise I'll call if I need anything. Tell Felicity not to worry. I'll be safe, I'll have fun, and I'll bring y'all some pastries. Tell Sim hi, and give Max some pats for me if he hasn't been too bad to deserve them."_

I ate my breakfast, packed the last of my things into the suitcase my aunt and uncle had given me when I moved out, and then headed to the airport. I had to get to France; I'd just need to hope I found Monty somehow while I was there. What else was I supposed to do?

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm less sorry for this bit

**Author's Note:**

> sorry?


End file.
